Tag Archives: green cleaning

Organizing Tips from a California Artist

Organizing Tips from a California Artist

Jana Botkin Oil Painting

Jana Botkin has given us many organizing tips already. If you missed her interview just go back to the Organizing section of this site and you’ll find her interview below this post. Jana is an artist in California who tries to live a simple lifestyle. You can check out her website here http://www.cabinart.net . If you’d like to see what’s in the mind and life of an artist you can follow her in her blog here
http://www.cabinart.net/weblog/

Below, Jana shares some more tips and ideas on how to stay organized and how to live a minimalist lifestyle. Enjoy!

1) Water in a spray bottle applied lightly to a cloth works better than Pledge.

2) I use soap.com for all of my toiletries. If you spend $40, the shipping is free. Their prices aren’t dirt cheap, but they do have sales and coupons. Besides, it’s worth spending an extra dollar on an item to avoid going into town (Jana lives in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada Mountain Range. A trip to town is almost a 2 hour round trip).

3) A friend told me that once a month she has an Eat-From-The-Freezer week. Brilliant!

4) I have two boxes of Christmas decorations. If something new comes in, something old gets tossed. The lids must fit.

5) Only keep one box of gift wrapping supplies.

6) Conditioner that you don’t like is great for shaving your legs with!

7) Only keep two sets of sheets per bed – 1 for summer and 1 for winter.

8 ) New clothing purchased must match something I already own.

9) If you don’t read ads, then you don’t start thinking you need things.

10) Never tell anyone that you collect something. When word gets out that you like a certain thing, it will start to come in. It can get overwhelming quickly.

There you have it! More insightful advice. I have to agree with the last one. I decided to collect something years ago and told a few people. One person (who was trying to be nice) bought me tons of these little things. First of all, it totally took the fun out of collecting something, and secondly I didn’t know where to put everything. What’s nice about collecting something yourself is you can add to your collection slowly. You can find room for things as you go.

I’m also going to try the Eat-From-Your-Freezer week. I know I have things in there that need to be used up.

I hope Jana’s advice was helpful. It’s always interesting to see how other people live and try to keep things to a minimum. Don’t forget to check out her website http://www.cabinart.net

How To Make Your Own Dusting Spray

How To Make Your Own Dusting Spray

It was that dreaded time of the month again – time to dust the living room. I really don’t like to dust, and I usually make my kids do it. I should probably dust more often than I do…but I don’t. This time I grabbed my orange scented Pledge dusting spray and thought to myself “Hmmm, can I make something that is as good as this…without the chemicals?

I found three dusting spray recipes online and tried all three. Unfortunately, I didn’t really like any of them. After messing around with the recipe I came up with one I liked. Feel free to change it any way you like. One recipe I found had 1/2 cup of olive oil in it (wow, that’s a lot!) and the other two only had 2 tablespoons (that just didn’t seem like enough). You may like your spray a little more or a little less oily than mine. I would start out with the 2 tablespoons and add more as you see fit.

Here’s my homemade dusting spray recipe:
4 teaspoons light olive oil
1/4 cup lemon juice
1/4 cup white vinegar
2 cups water
Spray bottle (16 oz size or larger)
*Instead of using the lemon juice and the white vinegar, you could use 1/2 cup of the homemade kitchen cleaner that I made in an earlier post. I tried it both ways and like the one with my homemade cleaner in it better because the vinegar smell wasn’t as strong.

Simply put all the ingredients in your spray bottle and shake to mix it up. Because it has water and oil in it, you’ll have to give it a little shake each time you use it. This gave my furniture a nice shine and it made me feel good knowing I wasn’t spraying things down with a bunch of chemicals. Plus this recipe is super cheap!

This mixture is much lighter in color than the homemade kitchen cleaner but, just so you or your family don’t get confused, it’s probably a good idea to label your spray bottle. You might even want to include the recipe you used so you’ll remember how to make it next time.

Make Your Own Powder Carpet Deodorizer

Make Your Own Powder Carpet Deodorizer

I love a house that smells good! I used to use a lot of room sprays and carpet deodorizers until they started to bother my daughter. Something in them was causing her eyes to itch and made it hard to breathe (who knows what kinds of chemicals are in those things). I decided to start making my own.

It turns out that making your own carpet deodorizer is VERY simple. All you need is an empty jar with a lid, baking soda, and your favorite essential oil. You can buy essential oils from your favorite health food store or from Mountain Rose Herbs (there is a link for them at the bottom of this article). For more information on essential oils, check my last article about adding essential oils to an all-purpose, make at home, kitchen spray.

Put one cup of baking soda into a jar, add 20 drops of your favorite scent (I added 1/4 cup baking soda and 5 drops of oil and then kept repeating in this pattern to make sure the oil was all throughout the jar), shake it up and let it sit for 12 hours with the lid on. There ya go! It’s done! Sprinkle a little on your carpet or furniture and let it sit for a minute or two and then vacuum it up. Today my house smells like Geranium Rose. I think when I run out, I’ll make a lavender one next!

Mountain Rose Herbs

Adding Essential Oils To Your Homemade Cleaning Products

Adding Essential Oils To Your Homemade Cleaning Products

In an earlier post, I showed you how I made a wonderful all-purpose cleaning spray. I have since made several batches of it and absolutely love it! One thing I’ve done to cut back on the vinegar smell (which really isn’t all that bad to begin with) is to use essential oils. I love essential oils. You can buy them from a place called Mountain Rose Herbs. They have many kinds of essential oils and most of them are organic and are very reasonably priced.

Mountain Rose Herbs

My favorite essential oil to add to my all-purpose spray is Tangerine oil. A .5 ounce bottle costs less than $3. I add about 20 drops to each batch of spray (you can add more if you like) and my bottle still looks full. It’s going to last me a long time! If you look on their website, you’ll find many essential oils to chose from.

If you’re going to buy essential oils from a health food store, make sure they are therapeutic grade and come in a blue or amber bottle (this helps to preserve their potency). Keep in mind that these oils are pretty potent – a little goes a long way! While most essential oils are great for your skin, a few may actually irritate it. It should say right on the bottle if this is a possibility. The tangerine oil I use in my all-purpose cleaner has a little warning on the back that says “potential skin irritant”. Since I use it in a cleaner I’m not concerned about it, however, I wouldn’t put it in my bath. I have gotten a few drops on my hands and it didn’t do anything.

There are many ways you can use essential oils to make your home (and homemade cleaners) smell great! Here are a few ideas:

*Put a few drops (I use 15) on a Kleenex and put it in your bag-less vacuum cleaner. When you run the vacuum it makes your room smell great!

*Put a few drops in a bottle with water and spray around your room as a room deodorizer (or spray your furniture).

*When you make a paste using baking soda and water for cleaning sinks or grout on your counter tops, add a few drops of essential oils.

The great thing about using essential oils to freshen up your home, is that the scent from these oils comes directly from a plant, fruit, or flower. You’re not spraying your home with chemicals which can cause many different kinds of illnesses. Plus it’s cheaper!

How to Make Your Own All Purpose Cleaner

How to Make Your Own All Purpose Cleaner

I came across a recipe on Facebook for an all-purpose cleaner you could make yourself. I’m really trying to cut down on the amount of chemicals I use around here, so I thought I would give it a try. Here is the recipe:

*A large jar with a lid (I used a mason jar)
*At least 6 lemons depending on the size of lemons and the size of the jar (you can also use oranges, grapefruit or limes)
*White vinegar

First cut the lemons in half and juice them to make lemonade (recipe for lemonade at the end of the post). Put the rinds in the large jar, fill to the top with vinegar, and put on the lid. Now you just let it sit for two weeks. That’s the hard part. I’m not a very patient person. After two weeks you remove the rinds, strain the liquid, and put the vinegar/citrus liquid in a spray bottle with water. You use one part water to one part of the vinegar/citrus mix. Mine made 1 2/3 cup of the mix so I added that much water.

Lemon rinds in vinegar

I made this two weeks ago, and this morning I got to open the jar and see if this stuff really works. My biggest concern was the smell. I’m not a huge fan of vinegar and I didn’t know if the lemon would over power it enough. To my delight, I opened the jar and didn’t gag! Yay! Good so far! Now the real test – how well does it clean?

I’ve been in my current house for three months now, and since that time I’ve tried and tried to get the shower door in my kids’ bathroom clean. Nothing I use does the trick. I decided to really put this stuff to the test. Again, to my delight (and utter astonishment), it cleaned the soap scum, water spots and mineral deposits off the door when all the many strong chemical cleaners couldn’t do it. Check out my door now!

Shower door with a section cleaned with the vinegar/citrus cleaner

Now for my favorite lemonade recipe:
6 lemons (or one cup of lemon juice – sometimes it takes 7 lemons depending on the size)
1 cup sugar (or one cup honey if you’d like to try something different)
4 cups water
1/2 cup blackberries (optional)

In a small sauce pan add 2 cups of water with one cup sugar. Cook and stir until sugar is dissolved (or use honey instead of sugar if you like). Once dissolved, set aside to cool.

Juice lemons until you get one cup of lemon juice.

Poor lemon juice and sugar water into a pitcher and add 2 cups of water (or more if you like it a little weaker).

If you want to add the blackberries, first put them in the blender, then put through a strainer. Add the liquid and stir. Yum!

*On a side note if you have a left over lemon rind put it in your garbage disposal and turn it on. It cleans and deodorizes while it’s in there!

How to Clean the Grout on a Tile Counter Top

How to Clean the Grout on a Tile Counter Top

I really don’t like counter tops with tile. Unfortunately, my last few houses have had tile counter tops in both the kitchen and the bathroom. The grout seems to stain and get dirty so easily.

I have always cleaned the grout between the tiles using those little bleach pens and an old toothbrush. Today when I started to clean the grout in the new house, I hated the thought of breathing in those awful bleach fumes. I’m really trying to remove a lot of chemicals in my house and clean things with vinegar,baking soda, and other natural things. That got me thinking – if I cleaned the grout with baking soda, would it work as well as bleach? There was only one way to find out. I cleaned a section of my counter top the way I always did with a bleach pen and a tooth brush. Then I did a section right next to it by pouring a little bit of baking soda on the counter and using a wet toothbrush (not the same one I used with the bleach) to scrub the grout lines.

Cleaning Grout with Baking Soda

First off, the bleached section smelled so bad it made me feel sick. But after scrubbing with a toothbrush for a few seconds or so, the grout looked almost as good as new. I did notice a few cracks in the grout which made me a little nervous. I didn’t remember seeing those before. The baking powder section took a little more elbow grease but not much. Not only was there no smell, but when I compared the sections right next to each other, I thought the baking soda side actually looked better.
Not only did I like the baking soda better, it’s also cheaper. Just in the small section I did with the bleach pen (probably a 2×2 foot area) I used half of the bleach pen. I only used a very small portion of my small box of baking soda.

Now before you try this at home, let me tell you that I have a white tiled counter top with white grout. If you have colored grout you probably don’t want to try the bleach at all. The best way to keep your grout clean is to try to keep it from getting grimy in the first place. A quick scrub with a tooth brush weekly, and wiping up spills as soon as they happen, will help keep your grout stain free.